Before we break for the weekend to watch the Olympics, we want to give you the opportunity to load up your iOS device with these other inspiring underdogs. These five indie iOS games each have something special– like a tortoise with a machine gun, or a bloody samurai sword. Read on for this week’s picks!

Everyone knows turtles are the tanks of the animal world, so what happens when you strap machine guns and artillery to the back of one and ride it around? In Shellrazer, you have to control an oversized armed turtle as he lays waste to goblin soldiers. At the end of certain levels, you’ll unlock new weapons to add to your turtle, plus coins to buy bonus power-ups. Shellrazer is a lot of fun, and for a game about a slow-walking reptile, it moves at a pretty quick pace.

The monsters in Greedy Monsters can’t stop eating, even when it’s not their turn. Your job is to build snack dispensers to keep the monsters healthy, and manage who gets to eat next. Later in the game, you’ll also have to keep the food supplies stocked up and scrub out pests. If you enjoy sorting or time-management games, Greedy Monsters will happily eat up a chunk of your time.

Samurai Rush is another auto-running game, but it’s got a visual style reminiscent of a Kurosawa flick. You play as a samurai who is avenging his slain family. While the running is automatic, you can slide up and down on the left side of the screen to move out of the way of the armed guards. The goal is to get them ready to strike, and then move out of the way and swipe on the right side of the screen to counterattack. Pick up this one if you’re looking for a significant challenge.

Dual Blocks doesn’t have much of a story, but it doesn’t need one. You control two identical figures who move on the top and bottom of the screen at the same time. To get them to the goal area at the same time, you’ll have to hold onto your environment or push against walls. It’s tricky to line everything up at the same time, but the last thing you want is to see disappointment on those expressionless faces.

NinjaBoy’s training allows him to stealthily infiltrate his former dojo and the enemy’s fortress, and all you have to do is tilt and tap. Tilting your device causes NinjaBoy to scurry left and right, and with a tap on the screen, you can jump onto tricky platforms and stay out of sight of the guards. NinjaBoy requires a delicate touch, so give it a try if you enjoy the subtle tilt mechanics of a game like Labyrinth 2 or Dark Nebula.

So many games come out for iOS on a regular basis that it can be difficult to keep track of them all, let alone review them. In this edition of Under the Radar, I highlight a handful of games from this summer that I enjoyed immensely. Whether it’s because of ingenuity in gameplay, or a great mix of old-school and new, these are games, in no particular order, that captured my attention over the last few months. (more…)

We regularly cover the big new iOS games, but there’s even more to the App Store. Every day, dozens of indie iOS games come out of the woodwork. Here are our picks for the best new games from small studios, which you might not have heard of yet.

It can be hard to find quality indie games on the App Store– not because there aren’t enough, but because there are too many. Instead of taking a chance based on a game’s App Store icon, description, and user reviews, try some of our suggestions this week for an alternative gaming experience. Even better– three of this week’s picks are free to download!

Big-name games tend to perform well in the App Store, because gamers often gravitate towards known commodities like After Burner Climax or Gun Bros 2. While we love to review popular brands, we’re also looking for the next big thing from the indie iOS development community. Here are our picks for the new indie iOS games that we think really shine.

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The fine folks at Milkbag games have released Sidewords. A fun little diversion of a word game that is the devil child of crosswords and scrabble. For each level in the game the grid must be completed to win the level — this means that each letter at the top and side must be used. And not just the top or side, but each word must be made up of letters from the top and side to create a grid. It’s a pain, but in the right kind of way. Even the simplest of the levels can be a head scratcher until you get used to the game. Well worth the $3 as a diversion while we wait for Milkbag to finally release Snow Siege.

We’d like to thank our sponsor for this week, Zap Zap Kindergarten Math.

It’s not always easy to tear your kids away from their tablets and make them do something edifying. Thankfully, Zap Zap Kindergarten Math relieves you of this task by turning mathematics into a fun touchscreen video game. Win win!

Aimed at children 3-6 years old, the app makes math fun by ‘gamifying’ it, turning simple mathematics problems into little challenges so that your pre-schooler can learn and play at the same time.

There are more than two dozen mini-games, split across three categories: Numbers, Shapes and Measurements, and Add and Subtract. According to the developer the difficulty of these puzzles is adaptive too, so kids of any ability can be both encouraged and challenged.

Mini Dayz has launched and it’s a pixelated 2.5D open world that’s as brutal as the desktop version. In this game, the player is dumped on shore with nothing. They must scavenge around for food, water, and weapons while avoiding attack. It’s the kind of game where the goal is to stay alive as long as possible. But that will never be very long. It’s oddly free and seems to only have an ad on the main screen — for now.

Pewter Games has brought their charming point and click adventure The Little Acre to iOS. It’s an amazingly beautiful animated adventure set in a sort of hybrid magical / alien world. A great all ages adventure and very fun.

We’d like to thank our sponsor for this week, The House of Da Vinci by Blue Brain Games. There’s a reason Leonardo Da Vinci is the only renaissance figure who routinely shows up in video games you know. With his remarkable inventiveness and genius for creative problem-solving, Da Vinci was a gamer through and through. He was just born 500 hundred years too soon. Thankfully, there are studios like Blue Brain Games to bring him to life in videogame form. The House of Da Vinci, which comes to us courtesy of a hugely successful Kickstarter campaign, is a puzzler that seeks to channel the artistry and innovation of its title character.

You play as one of Da Vinci’s more promising apprentices, and you have the challenging task of trying to work out where the hell he’s gone. Was he assassinated by the church? Who knows. Has he quietly gone into a retirement? Perhaps. Did he accidentally invent a shrink ray and shrink himself down to the size of an dustmite? Probably not. Da Vinci’s workshop looks beautiful, thanks to some impressive 3D graphics, and the in-game environment is crammed with all the elaborate machines and crazy inventions you’d expect to find in the workplace of a renaissance genius.(more…)

Poly Bridge is out now on iOS, and it’s good to have it! It’s a great game and many seem to agree that it’s the best bridge builder game available. But the iOS versions, so far, is missing the sandbox mode. I would hope that it’s coming soon in an update. If you are all interested in physics puzzlers, grab this one. (Note: the video is for the PC version, I have yet to see a trailer for the mobile version, the developer Dry Cactus isn’t that great at marketing…)

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